Good question!
First of all you need to know what type of skateboarding it is that you would like to be doing. Everything that has a variable has a purpose. When I used to skate I was strictly street. So, my preference was fast moving and lots of pop. If you’re completely new to it I wouldn’t recommend anything extravagant. E.G. lots of concave and high bearing speed. You need to learn basics first if you’re just starting out, and that’s being able to ride and ollie.
Now to understanding what everything does is also helpful. More concave (on the sides of the board, e.g. heal / toe) equals more flip and ability to rail (or board) slide. Lips are where you get your pop, e.g. how high the lips are from the ground. Lips are of course the nose and tail of the board. Both these elements you have to get the feel from the board. These two features won’t be listed as options when buying a deck. So, I wouldn’t recommend buying online just yet until you’re comfortable knowing how different companies build boards.
Wheels and bearings: Wheels are usually rated and this is how you figure out what use you can achieve from them. A 52mm 92A spitfire is quite different than a 52mm 84A. The number with the mm is of course the size of the wheel. Bigger size means more rotations, means the bigger the wheel the faster you will go. The second number is a bit trickier. That’s the softness of the wheel. The higher the number the harder the wheel will be. The harder the wheel is the faster you will go, but having an extremely hard wheel isn’t always a good thing unless you’re looking to do a lot of power slides. On the other hand softer wheels tend to decay faster, so powersliding would obliterate them very quickly.
Trucks and bushing: Usually this takes time to develop what exactly you want out of a good pair of truck and bushings combo. Trucks them selves are usually pretty basic, but some are quite lighter than others. Tite-lites are quite light while grind kings tend to be a bit heavier, but each company with explain which models are heavier and what not. Bushings are the polyurethane that is inbetween the axle and the base of the truck, this is where the kingpin goes into. Bushings come in different tensions. I myself prefer the Doh-Doh reds, which I believe are a medium. Most trucks already have their own bushings, but depends on how destructive you are with your riding, you might tend to let your axles outlast your bushings and this is where the Doh-Doh’s would come into play.
Hardware: These are the screws that hold the trucks to the board. This are a crucial part of the board and it’s a good rule of thumb not to slack on these, because they will break often. Especially starting out your ollies onto curbs. Your back truck might get caught and this puts stress on the hardware. Try not to get hardware that greatly juts out from the base on the truck side, this will cause them to bend when you do the curb maneuver and they can be difficult to get out at times. In between the base of the truck and the board you can put spacers/pads. This is why hardware comes in different lengths. Spacers/pads or personal preference, although a big spacer may give you more pop.
Pop is when you do an ollie and allows how high you might be able to get the board of the ground. e.g. a board is less pop may be more difficult to achieve a higher flight.
And finally the Deck: Decks come in all shapes and sizes based usually on company. A basic size is 82 long and 7.0wide. This is also something you might have to find out what you like through trial and error. Decks are usually 6–9 plys of maple, but I hear some are being made out of carbon and resin like materials now which sound kind of cool. I’d like to try them if I still skated. Grip tape is also preference. Some grips are better than others and some just plan stink.
Shoes: When buying shoes for skating (I usually), look for shoes that will be able to test time. Because lets face it, you will be destroying these shoes and you want to get as much skate’n out of them as possible. I try to look for something with multi layers and stitching on the toe area and a little heal coverage. You might not know where you’re wear marks might be, so worry about buying shoes after you destroy your first pair. Brand names are preference also. but I’ve never seen a pair of DC’s that lasted, IMHO.
Well, I think that pretty much covers it. Skate hard my friend!
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